Christchurch Cardboard Cathedral

One of Christchurch's exciting new buildings is the Transitional 'Cardboard' Cathedral which is being constructed on the site of the former St John's Latimer Square Anglican Church. The original Cathedral was badly damaged in the Christchurch earthquake in February 2011. It will be the world’s only cathedral made substantially of cardboard.

With a project cost of $5.5 million, the scope was to use under floor heating to heat the entire floor area from the entrance way (vestibule), Nave and Sanctuary by means of a heat pump.

This is a hydronic underfloor heating system that uses a “Tickleman” layout rather than the normal serpent design. There is a flow and return pipe system using 75mm aquatherm Blue down both sides of the building, connected by 16mm aquatherm underfloor heating pipe to give a balanced heating system. All of this sits on the main slab which has high density polystyrene on top and the pipes are tied to the reinforcing, then a sub slab is poured over the pipe.

The whole idea of this system is to give a heated floor which can be controlled, due to the topping slab, economically and environmentally.

Contractor:                 Naylor Love

UFH Consultants:       Powell Fenwick Consultants – Christchurch

Designed by                Nick Yannakis and Sam Seatter

Installed by:                David Browne Contractors – Christchurch